A Study of German Lutheran Communion Hymnody the Early Years

The goal of this thesis is to demonstrate that in the early years of Lutheranism, what the faithful sang and confessed about the Sacrament of the Altar is dangerously close to being forgotten by American Lutherans in the latter half of the twentieth century. What Christians sing about as they are given the body and blood of their risen Lord reveals both their confessional stance and their piety. By digging into the treasure-store of German Lutheran Communion hymnody, the theology of the Sacrament as confessed in the early years of Lutheranism will be brought to light and offered to the contemporary Church for the renewal of her own confession and piety

Design of multipass fractionating trays

Multipass fractionating trays are vapor-liquid contacting devices with high liquid handling capabilities which can be economically used in large fractionating towers. However, process design engineers in the chemical and petroleum industries seem to have an aversion to specifying multipass trays for their tower designs. This thesis presents the case for using multipass trays as well as methods for their design. Because multipass trays are not symmetrical, as one and two pass trays are, the liquid and vapor need not split equally between the three or four passes. Equations are developed which enable the vapor and liquid flowrate for each pass to be determined. A computer program is presented which is capable of either rating existing multipass trays or designing multipass trays for new services. Also, techniques for the optimum design of multipass trays are suggested. The present energy shortage has provided strong incentive to build larger refineries, which means larger capacity fractionation towers are required. This thesis demonstrates how the use of multipass trays can reduce investment costs for these large towers. The use of the tools presented in this thesis enable process engineers to design multipass trays without relying on the proprietary techniques and programs of others, not readily available to them. It is hoped that this will enable multipass trays to be specified whenever they are economically justified

Maximum entropy and network approaches to systemic risk and foreign exchange

The global financial system is an intricate network of networks, and recent financial crises have laid bare our insufficient understanding of its complexity. In response, within the five chapters of this thesis we study how interconnectedness, interdependency and mutual influence impact financial markets and systemic risk. In the first part, we investigate the community formation of global equity and currency markets. We find remarkable changes to correlation structure and lead-lag relationships in times of economic turmoil, implying significant risks to diversification based on historical data. The second part focuses on banks as creators of credit. Bank portfolios generally share some overlap, and this may introduce systemic risk. We model this using European stress test data, finding that the system is stable across a broad range of asset liquidity and risk tolerance. However, there exists a phase transition: If banks become sufficiently risk averse, even small shocks may inflict great losses. Failure to address portfolio overlap thus may leave the banking system ill-prepared. Complete knowledge of the financial network is prerequisite to such systemic risk analyses. When lacking this knowledge, maximum entropy methods allow a probabilistic reconstruction. In the third part of this thesis, we consider Japanese firm-bank data and find that reconstruction methods fail to generate a connected network. Deriving an analytical expression for connection probabilities, we show that this is a general problem of sparse graphs with inhomogeneous layers. Our results yield confidence intervals for the connectivity of a reconstruction. The maximum entropy approach also proves useful for studying dependencies in financial markets: On its basis, we develop a new measure for the information content in foreign exchange rates in part four of this thesis and use it to study the impact of macroeconomic variables on the strength of currency co-movements. While macroeconomic data and the law of supply and demand drive financial markets, foreign exchange rates are also subject to policy interventions. In part five, we classify the roles of currencies within the market with a clustering algorithm and study changes after political and monetary shocks. This methodology may further provide a quantitative underpinning to existing qualitative classifications.2019-12-11T00:00:00

A Strong X-Ray Burst from the Low Mass X-Ray Binary EXO0748-676

We have observed an unusually strong X-ray burst as a part of our regular eclipse timing observations of the low mass binary system EXO0748-676. The burst peak flux was 5.2x10^-8 ergs cm^-2 s^-1, approximately five times the normal peak X-ray burst flux observed from this source by RXTE. Spectral fits to the data strongly suggest that photospheric radius expansion occurred during the burst. In this Letter we examine the properties of this X-ray burst, which is the first example of a radius expansion burst from EXO0748-676 observed by RXTE. We find no evidence for coherent burst oscillations. Assuming that the peak burst luminosity is the Eddington luminosity for a 1.4 solar mass neutron star we derive a distance to EXO0748-676 of 7.7 kpc for a helium-dominated burst photosphere and 5.9 kpc for a hydrogen-dominated burst photosphere.Comment: 15 pages including 2 figures and 1 table. Accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journa

Emil Kraepelin and Walter Benjamin: distant contemporaries, diverse working methods, any resonance?

The work methods of eminent psychiatrist Emil Kraepelin (1856–1926) and of literary and cultural critic Walter Benjamin (1892–1940) are described based on the literature describing their ways of working. Kraepelin’s approach of cross-sectional observation of symptoms and the longitudinal study of illness course in distinguishing ‘disease entities’ as well as his research strategy of investigating causes and correlates using methods of experimental psychology, pathology and neurobiology are described. Critical statements (on Kraepelin’s work) highlighting preconceived concepts, ideological positions and a lack of critical reflection are reported. Walter Benjamin’s use of citation and ‘collage’ in literary and cultural criticism, his use of the concepts of allegory, ‘figures of thought’ and ‘dialectical images’ is described. His theory of the past impacting on our understanding of present and immediate future is discussed. Benjamin’s thinking is centered around the concept of ‘experience’. The relevance of both scientists to current challenges is discussed referring to current psychiatric research and peer support, a key concept in discussions on mental health care. The paper argues that Kraepelin and Benjamin could be considered complementary in their approaches to mental health matters taking into account wider cultural contexts

A Tale of Two Systems: Conflict, Law and the Development of Water Allocation in Two Common Law Jurisdictions

This paper examines how the law governing water has evolved in the United States and Australia. The evolution of water law in these jurisdictions demonstrates that the ‘scientific modernism’ that prioritises economics and hydrology as the pivots around which water institutions are designed may be an incomplete model. From the history we recount, we suggest that, ranking equally with these considerations in shaping water law and policy, is the broader framework of laws and institutions, and legal culture within a society. These factors shape the types of solutions to conflicts in a society and determine, to a substantial degree, the solutions to water conflicts that become law, which then in part determine future legal solutions. This observation is of more than theoretical importance. Towards the end of this paper we consider the latest water modernist experiment, the Australian Water Act. We suggest that closer attention to social factors and legal traditions would have resulted in a more effective law. We believe this holds important lessons for water policy generally